Sabah crisis: Is Aquino siding with Malaysia to protect relatives’ business interests?

Presidential cousin and funder Tonyboy Cojuangco’s AirAsia business pals transport Malaysian army reinforcements to Sabah. (Photo from Borneo Inside)

The “journey home” to Sabah of some 200 followers of the Sultanate of Sulu more than a month ago has escalated into a full blown humanitarian crisis. More than a thousand Filipinos have fled Sabah that for decades they called home. Men, women and children took any boat available in a frantic and perilous voyage away from the brutality of Malaysian forces. The number of refugees in Tawi-Tawi from Lahad Datu and other affected towns in Sabah is expected to grow in the coming days.

Those who fled recounted the atrocities that Filipinos suffered in the disputed territory. “Malaysian policemen ordered Filipino men to run as fast as they could and shot them,” said a report by the Philippine Daily Inquirer. “Even pregnant women and children have been hunted down and killed as the Malaysians fire mortars and embark on a house-to-house search,” according to the Philippine Star. These people are not part of the armed followers of Sultan Jamalul Kiram III. They just happen to be Filipinos.

Some are baffled while most are enraged by the attitude of the Aquino administration towards the Sabah crisis. From the onset, President Benigno Aquino III took a hardline stance against the Sulu royal forces. Jamalul’s brother Rajah Mudah Agbimuddin Kiram and his men must surrender before any talks can happen, Aquino insisted. Charges are being prepared versus the Kirams, claimed the Justice department. They may also be turned over to Malaysian authorities to face prosecution. Malacañang sowed intrigues to cast doubt on the motive and legitimacy of the Sultanate. The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) is probing the alleged conspiracy between the Kirams and certain politicians. All these even as Aquino ignored appeals by the Sultanate and the United Nations (UN) to stop the Malaysian military assault and for parties to talk.

Palace and Foreign Affairs spokespersons, of course, expressed concern over the reported human rights abuses in Sabah. But their statements are meaningless amid the brutal military offensive launched by Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak that Aquino practically sanctioned with his reckless position. The public perception is that Aquino abandoned his own people, surrendered the country’s rightful claim to Sabah and sided with Malaysia. Thus Aquino, like Razak and his forces, is responsible for the carnage of Filipino men, women and children in Sabah.

But why is Aquino siding with Malaysia? One plausible explanation noted by analysts is the ongoing peace talks with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) where Malaysia plays a key role as facilitator. Aquino does not want to displease Malaysia and risk undermining the negotiations.

However, it is also notable that since taking over in 2010, Aquino’s relatives who bankrolled his presidential bid have inked business deals with Malaysia. Could these business interests be another possible explanation for the administration’s handling of the Sabah crisis?

What are these business deals? One involves San Miguel Corporation (SMC) of Aquino’s uncle Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco Jr. In August 2011, SMC acquired three subsidiaries of US oil giant Exxon Mobil’s downstream oil business in Malaysia. Worth $610 million, the transaction included the purchase by SMC of Esso Malaysia Bhd, Exxon Mobil Malaysia Sdn Bhd and Exxon Mobil Borneo Sdn Bhd. In its website, SMC said that the three companies form an integrated business engaged in refining, distribution and marketing of petroleum products. The physical assets include the 88,000 barrels per day Port Dickson refinery; seven fuel distribution terminals; and about 560 refilling stations.

SMC’s entry into the Malaysian downstream oil industry could be just the initial steps. Ramon S. Ang, president of the giant conglomerate, recently disclosed that SMC is eyeing big oil and natural gas field overseas. “If we were able to buy one of those, it would be like printing money forever,” Ang was quoted as saying. SMC is so serious about the plan that Ang said they are willing to let go of longtime core business San Miguel Brewery Inc. and new assets in power generation to raise funds. With its acquisition of Exxon Mobil’s downstream assets, SMC is in a strategic position to also corner upstream deals in oil-rich Malaysia.

The disputed state of Sabah itself is abundant in oil and gas resources. An article by the Philippine Star, quoting a 2012 study by Singapore-based FACTS Global Energy, reported that Sabah has reserves of about 11-12 trillion cubic feet of gas and at least 1.5 billion barrels of oil. The figures represent 12% and 15% of Malaysia’s natural gas and oil reserves, respectively, according to the report. Another article, by the Centre for Research on Globalization, noted that Sabah has 15 oil wells that can produce as many as 192,000 barrels a day. Also, four new oil fields have been discovered in its territorial waters in the past two years further increasing Sabah’s potential as oil producer.

Is Aquino avoiding displeasing Malaysia over the Sabah dispute so as not to undermine the grand multibillion dollar oil and gas ambitions of SMC and uncle Danding?

Another business deal involves AirAsia Philippines, the local affiliate of Malaysia-based AirAsia Bhd, the largest budget carrier in Southeast Asia. In November 2010, the Board of Investments (BOI) approved the formation of AirAsia Philippines as a joint venture between Malaysian investors and Filipino businessmen led by the President’s cousin Antonio “Tonyboy” Cojuangco Jr. Tonyboy and his Malaysian partners are aggressively expanding their operation in the Philippines with their recent acquisition of at least a 40% stake in local rival Zest Airways Inc.

Does Aquino fear that the contentious Sabah issue could somehow complicate the blooming Malaysian business partnership of his cousin Tonyboy?

Aquino could not just ignore the interests of his rich relatives. He won’t be President without their vital support.

Tonyboy was the biggest campaign donor of Aquino in 2010, based on the President’s official declaration to the Commission on Elections (Comelec). Out of the P440 million in campaign funds declared by Aquino, Tonyboy’s contribution accounted for almost a quarter with P100 million. While Danding was not officially listed as a campaign donor, it is widely known that the tycoon and Marcos crony also supported the candidacy of his nephew.

If these business interests of his relatives played a key role in Aquino’s handling of the crisis, then the slaughter of our men, women and children in Sabah becomes much more revolting and enraging than it already is. (End)

Economy in 2012: Rising joblessness, poverty amid Aquino admin’s claims of growth

Joblessness, poverty and hunger are reaching record highs under the Aquino administration amid claims of growing economy (Photo from www.flickr.com)

In 2012, the dominant theme peddled by the Aquino administration was “good governance is good economics”. The main propaganda line of Malacañang is that the “daang matuwid” (straight path) has created a favorable environment for economic growth that is inclusive. From being the sick man of Asia, the country now brims with vitality, declared President Benigno Aquino III in his State of the Nation Address (Sona).

To the uncritical, such assertions would seem hard to doubt. For one, the national accounts do show rosy numbers. The Philippines is beating expectations and has been one of the supposed few bright spots amid a gloomy world economy. International banks, local and foreign investors, credit rating agencies and multilateral financial institutions are one in saying that the prospects are indeed upbeat for the country. There are even claims that we are the new tiger in the region, joining the likes of Singapore and South Korea.

Good news for big business

After growing by 7.1% in the third quarter, way above the market’s media forecast of 5.4%, the gross domestic product (GDP) has now expanded by 6.5% for the year. The strong third quarter performance prompted economic managers to revise upwards their 2012 full year GDP growth projection with the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) claiming that the GDP will likely grow by 7% this year, well beyond the earlier official forecast of 5-6 percent. Many share the same optimism like the World Bank which also raised its projection to 6% from the previous 4.2 percent.

Meanwhile, Standard and Poor’s (S&P) upgraded the credit rating of the Philippines from “stable” to “positive” following the GDP report which put the country on track to make investment grade by next year. Officials say this means lower borrowing cost for government and lower cost for doing business in the Philippines. Prior to the S&P upgrade, the country has already posted eight credit rating upgrades since 2010. These developments continued to feed optimism in the market with trading at the Philippine Stock Exchange posting 38 record highs this year, making it one of the most vibrant equities market worldwide.

Other economic data, as culled by the Christmas Day Inquirer editorial, also seem encouraging. In the first nine months of the year and amid the global crisis, exports grew by 7.2% and foreign direct investments (FDI) by 40% compared to the same period in 2011. Consequently, as of November, the country has an all-time high of $84.1 billion in gross international reserves (GIR) and a balance of payments (BOP) surplus of $2 billion, five times its value during the same month last year.

The country’s big business groups share government’s high optimism, citing the so-called good economic fundamentals in 2012 that can lead to a “super-year” in 2013. They see more opportunities to further boost profits with the anticipated investment grade rating, the implementation of public-private partnership (PPP) projects and the upcoming midterm elections.

Big business, of course, has every reason to be upbeat. High GDP growth, robust stock market and favorable credit rating all reflect not the state of the ordinary people but of how lucrative the economy is for the moneyed few. Further, past and present policies of privatization and deregulation have allowed them to monopolize and greatly profit (through generous perks, incessant hikes in rates and user fees, and exploitation of workers) from key economic activities including public utilities and infrastructure development.  This small group of the super-rich has seen their wealth balloon in recent years. In 2009, the Forbes magazine reported that the 40 richest Filipinos had a combined wealth of $22.4 billion and in 2011, the amount more than doubled to $47.43 billion. The economy is growing but that’s good news only for big business.

Hard realities

Because amid the purportedly stellar growth of the economy, series of credit rating upgrades, streak of stock market highs and favorable reviews by banks, fund managers and investors are the hard realities of rising joblessness, worsening hunger and deteriorating poverty. Social indicators which are most vital to the people have been deteriorating in the past three years amid the record-high profits and wealth of elite families, high investor confidence and positive market sentiment.

Official unemployment rate as measured by the National Statistics Office (NSO) averaged 7% in 2011 and 2012 from 7.3% in 2010. We are supposed to be the second fastest growing economy in the region just behind China but the official jobless rates of our neighbors are much lower. Thailand’s is 0.7%; Singapore, 2.1%; Malaysia, 3%; South Korea, 3.8%; China, 4%; and Taiwan, 4.2 percent. To be sure, like in the Philippines, these official unemployment figures understate the true extent of domestic joblessness in the respective countries. But we cite them for the simple comparison of official data on the labor markets in the region. (Data on Asian countries are as of first quarter 2012 as compiled by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas or BSP. During the same period, our official unemployment rate was 7.2 percent.)

And we have not even looked at the quality of available jobs. A quick peek at the NSO’s preliminary October 2012 Labor Force Survey shows that underemployed workers – those who are employed but are still looking for additional work – numbered 7.2 million; self-employed without any paid employee, 10.7 million; and unpaid family workers, 4.1 million. That’s easily 22 million out of the reported 37.7 million employed workers (more than 58%) with disputable quality of jobs.

Then for wage and salary workers, there’s the issue of extremely low pay amid a very high cost of living (made even worse by Aquino’s enforcement of the two-tier wage system which imposes a floor wage that is even lower than the minimum wage) as well as job insecurity amid widespread labor contractualization. The last time the National Wages and Productivity Commission (NWPC) issued its estimate of family living wage (which could approximate the amount needed by a regular family to live decently) it pegged it at ₱917 per day as of September 2008 in Metro Manila. More than four years later, Metro Manila’s daily minimum wage is still a measly ₱419-456.

To have an idea of how massive job scarcity in the Philippines could be, we may refer to the regular surveys of the Social Weather Stations (SWS). In 2010, 22.5% of Filipino workers said they were jobless which increased to 23.6% in 2011. This year, it ballooned to 30.1 percent. In absolute terms, there were about 9.5 million unemployed workers in 2010 and 2011; this year, it climbed to 12.1 million workers. In Aquino’s first three years in power, the number of workers who said that they were jobless increased by 2.6 million based on SWS surveys.  (Results of SWS surveys cited in this article all refer to annual averages.)

With the economy not producing enough jobs and livelihood opportunities even as wages become even more depressed, poverty and consequently hunger have been at their worst. Again using the SWS surveys, 47.5% of Filipino families considered themselves poor in 2010. Since then, the percentage has steadily climbed to 49.3% in 2011 and 51% this year. There are now around 10.3 million families who consider themselves poor, up from 9.9 million in 2011 and 8.9 million two years ago. Thus, in the first half of Aquino’s term, the number of poor families ballooned by 1.4 million. This means that some 7 million Filipinos have been added to the number of poor in the past three years. Note that between 2009 and 2012, the budget for the controversial conditional cash transfer (CCT) program swelled from just ₱5 billion to ₱39.4 billion (a whopping 688% increase) but apparently failing to make a dent on poverty.

Hunger incidence, still as surveyed by the SWS, follows the same path. In 2010, the percentage of families who reported to have experienced hunger was at 19.1 percent. It climbed to 19.9% the next year and to 21.1% this year. In absolute figures, there were 3.6 million hungry families in 2010; 4 million in 2011; and 4.3 million in 2012. Under Aquino, the number of Filipino families who experience hunger has so far grown by 700,000 or about 3.5 million people as measured by the SWS.

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“Growth” built on maldevelopment

BPO and labor export as growth drivers is an aberration because their prevalence is symptomatic of the economy’s continuing failure to industrialize (Photo from callcenterphilippines.com)

Written for The Philippine Online Chronicles

The National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) reported that the Philippine gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 7.1% in the third quarter of 2012. The expansion was beyond the general expectation of 5.4% and second only to China’s 7.7 percent. Encouraged by the “surprising growth”, government chief economist Arsenio Balisacan is predicting that the country will surpass its 5-6% growth target for 2012. Earlier, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) also forecast that the Philippines will grow faster than projected and could become the only economy in the world that will beat expectations.

It’s not every day that the economy outperforms forecasts and ranks behind the region’s largest economy so this must be good news, right? But if you are assuming that we are finally on the path toward sustained and inclusive growth thanks to the good governance reforms of the Aquino administration, you might want to rethink your optimism.

Because the hard truth is that our supposed economic growth is an aberration, a result of our maldevelopment. It is “growth” that is being spurred by volatile foreign capital and markets and not by dynamic and reliable domestic productive sectors. It is growth that underlines the structural defects of our economy. Thus, it could never be banked on to produce long-term jobs and curb poverty, much less jumpstart national industrialization. (For a discussion on job creation and inclusive growth, read this earlier article on GDP growth.)

Let us look at the latest national accounts released by the NSCB. The 7.1% expansion in the GDP was mainly the result of the extraordinary performance of the construction sector both in the production and consumption sides. NSCB data show that by industrial origin, the gross value added (GVA) in construction grew by 24.3% in the third quarter, the largest among all sectors. Manufacturing, on the other hand, expanded by just 5.7 percent. Meanwhile, construction expenditure expanded by 24.8% during the same period, easily the fastest growth rate among all types of expenditures that contributed to the GDP growth. (See Table)

What’s driving the scorching growth in construction? Is the country constructing new infrastructure and factories to support the building of national industries? Is the economy producing domestically sourced surplus income that spurs the demand for residential construction?

Sadly, no. The high growth in construction, and consequently the acceleration in the GDP growth, is mainly attributable to the inflows of funds from external sources, in particular the foreign direct investments (FDI) for the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector and the remittances of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs). These externally driven funds are fuelling the so-called “construction boom” in the country, which in turn pushed the substantial GDP growth.

BPO, according to industry sources, has been driving up demand for new office space which is expected to hit a record 400,000 to half a million square meters this year, or an increase of as much as 25% from 2011. Such expansion in BPO commercial space is extremely limited to the country’s BPO hubs. Of the 2.2 million square meters in additional office space for BPO up to 2015, 69% are in Quezon City, Makati, Mandaluyong and Manila while the rest is in other major urban centers like the cities of Davao and Cebu. Certainly, this isn’t inclusive growth both geographically and in terms of the demographic of the domestic labor market. Meanwhile, OFWs continue to stimulate residential construction, with foreign buying of property increasing by 61% this year, according to industry sources.

Why is growth stimulated by BPO and OFWs an aberration?  Because their predominance in economic production is actually symptomatic of the country’s continuing failure to develop and industrialize. Both are the results of the domestic economy’s longstanding structural inability to generate sustainable and productive jobs from vibrant local industries including the manufacture of consumer and industrial goods and modernized agriculture.

Without a national industrialization plan, we are forced to rely on what the US and other rich countries require us to do for their advanced economies.  Since the 1970s, they made us production workers in their global assembly lines and factories. Since the 2000s, they made us call center agents to service the various needs of their clients. In both cases, the rationale has been the same – for American and other foreign firms to exploit our cheap labor in order to cut costs and maximize their profits. To be sure, they do create some jobs but just enough to meet their needs while the jobs generated are totally detached from our own development needs. They are just squeezing dry our labor and human resources while the economy is left with crumbs in the form of several million dollars in investments and several hundred thousand jobs amid tens of millions in employment needs.

The same thing is true with labor export that deprives the economy of the productive capacity of its own work force. Certainly, the remittances keep the economy afloat and provide the much needed boost for consumer spending. But when measured against what is being taken away from us when millions of our skilled workers, scientists and engineers, health workers, teachers, etc. use their invaluable skills to serve the needs of other countries instead of ours, the net impact is far more disastrous economically (not to mention the social costs of labor export).

The maldevelopment of our economy is further emphasized when Malacañang and the IMF boast that the Philippines will continue to grow and be resilient amid the global economic crisis. The reason behind such resilience is not because the economy is internally-driven but because our main drivers of growth – BPO and labor export – are precisely useful cost-cutting schemes for the crisis-hit economies of the First World to cope with the economic crunch. In other words, we may continue to “grow” amid the global crisis at the great expense of our workers who will be forced to accept further exploitative arrangements in the form of more depressed wages and lack of social protection whether as an irregular call center agent here or an undocumented migrant worker in the States.

A country of call center agents and exported workers will just never industrialize. ###

Noynoy relatives actually funded ₱18 M of Akbayan’s whopping ₱112-M 2010 poll expenditures

Akbayan actually received ₱18 million in campaign funds for the 2010 elections from President Aquino’s relatives. RG Cruz of ABS-CBN News reported that Akbayan, which is facing disqualification complaints before the Commission on Elections (Comelec), received ₱14 million from presidential sisters Kris (₱10 million), Ballsy (₱2 million) and Viel (₱2 million). But Akbayan also received funds from Viel’s husband Richard Dee (₱3 million) and Aquino’s maternal relatives from the Lopa family (₱1 million). Thus, the total amount that Akbayan directly received from presidential relatives could reach at least ₱18 million.

(See Table below)

Another ₱1 million came from a member of the Board of Trustees of the Cory and Ninoy Aquino Foundation (NCAF), Daniel Lichauco. As Cruz reported, Aquino family friend and presidential appointee Margie Juico, chair of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO), gave another ₱1 million. So that puts the amount contributed to Akbayan by people with direct ties to Pres. Aquino at ₱20 million, a staggering sum by any standard, and especially so in a party-list standard.

Download the full list of Akbayan’s 2010 campaign contributors 

It’s safe to assume that there are other rich family friends of the Aquinos who contributed to Akbayan’s 2010 election war chest because of the group’s ties to the then presidential bet. There’s no way that a truly under-represented and marginalized party-list group could have raised a total of ₱112.18 million in campaign funds for a single election, even higher than the declared funds of the Nacionalista Party (NP), pegged at ₱80 million. NP is a major political party that the law bars from participating in party-list elections.

Note likewise that Akbayan officials, who supposedly come from marginalized sectors, have also contributed millions of pesos in campaign funds for the group’s 2010 electoral bid. Akbayan representative Walden Bello, for instance, donated ₱1.4 million on top of another ₱2 million that he loaned for Akbayan’s campaign funds. Former Akbayan president Joel Rocamora, appointed by Aquino as head of the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) also contributed ₱1 million. Kayrami namang pera ng mga taong ito.

In a statement, Akbayan argued that the campaign contributions did not come from “illegal, unscrupulous, or tainted sources.” And as usual, when faced with an issue it could not confront head on, Akbayan resorted to red-baiting and accused its critics of using NPA (New People’s Army) revolutionary taxes from mining and logging companies for their electoral campaign. Presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda, who it seems is also moonlighting as Akbayan spokesperson, defended the campaign contributions saying that the Aquino sisters, as private citizens, have a right to contribute to Akbayan for supporting the President.

But again, Akbayan and Malacañang are missing, or more likely, sidetracking the real issue. The point is not whether the sources of Akbayan’s campaign funds are illegal or not. The simple fact that a significant amount of their 2010 electoral spending was directly bankrolled by the Aquino family further bolsters the argument that they do not represent the under-represented and marginalized. How can they claim to represent the farmers when Akbayan is being funded by one of the country’s richest and most powerful landlord families? How can Akbayan claim to fiscalize Aquino on the issue of land reform when the president’s family bankrolled their electoral campaign?

Even their claim that their track record is their best defense will not hold water. Their favorite showcase of supposed legislative triumph, the Carper or the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with Reforms, is not facilitating the massive redistribution of farm lands in the possession of big landlords, but quite the contrary. Case in point is Hacienda Luisita, wherein Carper legitimized the otherwise immoral claim of Akbayan’s biggest patron – the Aquino family – for a “just compensation” worth billions of pesos even after squeezing the farmers dry for decades by owning the land that was never rightfully theirs. Even the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), which supported Carper, is complaining the very slow progress in land acquisition and distribution under the Aquino administration.

Really, the best defense that Akbayan could muster to answer the string of controversies it is facing is cheap, baseless propaganda directly copied from the “Palparan Handbook on Red-baiting.” The primary source of RG Cruz’s report was an official Comelec document. To respond to it by maliciously claiming that NPA revolutionary taxes are being used as campaign funds by their critics is outrageously reckless amid the continuing extra-judicial killings and enforced disappearances of political activists from people’s organizations tagged as communist fronts by the military.

Backed into a corner, Akbayan has become more vicious in its red-baiting. But while further exposing its true colors as a mouthpiece of the status-quo and an advocate of the bloody military campaign against people who are truly working for the under-represented and marginalized, Akbayan has yet to give a convincing answer to the legitimate question that even the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) has raised – marginalized at under-represented ba kayo? ###

Junking the Marcosian debt policy for people’s needs

Despite its trappings of reformist language, the Aquino administration’s budget proposals are still reflective of the same anti-people and anti-development policy thinking of the past regimes; and still emasculated by the Marcosian automatic debt servicing

Continued from Part 1

Until today, under post-Martial Law so-called democratic regimes, the Marcosian policy of automatic debt servicing and the heavy debt burden continue to cripple the capacity of government to provide sufficient social services and attend to the basic needs of the people. In an earlier research, think tank Ibon Foundation noted that Filipino taxpayers will continue to shoulder the Marcos debts until 2025, more than half a century since the late strongman imposed Martial Law.

The most controversial and biggest white elephant funded by Marcos debts and paid for by taxpayers was the $2.3-billion Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP). While we have already completed the payment for the BNPP that has never produced a single kilowatt of electricity, government continues to look for funding sources for the maintenance of the mothballed nuke plant.

These issues take more significance every time Congress prepares the national budget. Since taking over, the Aquino administration has been peddling the deception that unlike in the past, government’s priority now is the provision of social services and empowerment of the people through well-funded programs that directly benefit the poor. But as already noted, automatic payments for principal and interest continue to eat up the largest portion of public resources, including in the so-called 2013 “Empowerment Budget” of the Aquino administration.

Still way short

The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) describes its proposed 2013 national budget as an “Empowerment Budget” because it supposedly heeds the people’s demand to ensure that government resources are used for their benefit. One indicator, said the DBM, is the increase in the budget allocation for social services, which will get the lion’s share of the proposed ₱2.006-trillion budget at 34.8%, up from last year’s 33.8 percent.

Of the proposed budget for social services (₱698.4 billion), the combined allocation for basic education, health and housing is pegged at ₱365.6 billion, which represent the proposed budget for the Education and Health departments, and government’s housing programs excluding those for the soldiers and police. But this amount is just about ¼ of the needed budget to reasonably meet the demands of the people for such services. Based on urgent needs as well as international standards, it is estimated that the budget for basic education, health and housing alone should be about ₱1.4 trillion. Of the said amount, basic education accounts for ₱885 billion (as estimated by the ACT Teachers); health, ₱440 billion (Coalition for Health Budget Increase or CBHI); and housing ₱ 97billion (Ibon).

Resources for social services

There are possible sources of funding for such huge needs of basic social services but it requires a substantial reorientation in government policies and shift in priorities. Based on the 2013 budget, for instance, there are some ₱860 billion that can be tapped, partially or wholly, to fund basic education, health and housing.

Of the said amount, the largest portion is comprised of the national government’s debt service burden, which is pegged at ₱782.2 billion for principal amortization and interest payments. The rest comes from programs and projects whose concept and/or expected benefits are disputed such as the conditional cash transfer (CCT) program, public-private partnership (PPP), counterinsurgency-related initiatives, privatization obligations from past projects, and tourism promotion and development. (See Table 3)

Debt servicing still represents the biggest drain in the country’s already limited resources. Adding principal amortization to interest payments, debt servicing comprises almost 32% of what the Aquino administration is planning to spend in 2013. At ₱782.2 billion, debt servicing is bigger than the budget for all social services in the current budget proposal, pegged at ₱698.4 billion or 28% of the budget including principal amortization.

As pointed out, the culprit is the Martial Law-era automatic debt servicing policy of government. This policy has greatly undermined the constitutional duty of Congress to allocate funds that will meet the pressing needs of the people. Under EO 292, government computes all public debt obligations that have to be settled and automatically sets aside the needed amount to ensure timely payments.

Meanwhile, Congress has to make do with whatever is left of government’s meager resources to budget for the social and development needs of the people. What makes this whole situation more unjust and oppressive is that most of the country’s public debt has been used for projects and/or programs that were tainted with corruption, did not benefit the people or worse, had caused more hardship to the poor. Examples include the power privatization loans from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) which have already reached around $1.3 billion since 2002.

There are many other odious loans that should be reviewed, renegotiated and/or altogether cancelled to reduce the debt burden. But EO 292 deprives Congress and the Filipino people of this policy option.

Debt-funded dole

Even the much ballyhooed CCT program is being partly funded by foreign debt worth $805 million from the ADB and the World Bank, adding to the country’s debilitating debt burden. And while adding to the debt burden, the CCT’s positive impact on alleviating poverty is also suspect. Between 2009 and 2012, the number of CCT beneficiaries ballooned from 594,356 households to more than 3 million (or an enormous 407% increase); the national budget for CCT during the same period also swelled from ₱5 billion to ₱39.4 billion (or a whopping 688% hike). But self-rated poverty, as measured by the Social Weather Stations (SWS) worsened from an average of 48% in 2010 to 51% this year.

Privatization and debt

Funding PPP initiatives, on the other hand, is problematic given the country’s experience with privatization in the past two decades. PPP schemes in the water and power sectors, for instance, have resulted in soaring and exorbitant user fees. Aquino’s plan to tap PPP to construct school buildings and health facilities is fe

ared to further marginalize the poor as fees skyrocket to ensure the profits of participating private contractors while aggravating the indebtedness of government.

In fact, the national budget has long been being undermined by the impact of such onerous PPP contracts. Case in point is the controversial build-lease-transfer (BLT) contract to run the metro rail transit (MRT) where the Aquino administration is pushing to implement a fare hike of as much as 100% to pass on to commuters the government’s debt obligations and guaranteed profits of the private investor. Another is the National Power Corp. (Napocor) which after a decade of privatization and doubling of electricity rates is still mired in deep debts reaching almost P1 trillion, portion of which will be directly shouldered by consumers through the universal charge.

Other reforms

Budget items related to government’s counterinsurgency campaign can also be diverted to basic social services. Poverty alleviation initiatives like the Payapa at Masaganang Pamayanan (Pamana) and CCT being used as part of the Oplan Bayanihan actually undermines the peace and development process by marginalizing efforts to address the root causes of insurgency (i.e. peasant landlessness) based on the fundamental principle of social justice while perpetuating the conflict and rampant human rights violations.

Aside from these items in the proposed 2013 budget, revenue generation can also be significantly increased by improving collection efficiency, reforming the tax system to maximize collections from the rich and reversing the neoliberal policies that deprived government of revenues such as trade liberalization as well as the numerous fiscal incentives to attract investors. Around ₱867 billion in new revenues can be raised from these reforms, based on Ibon estimates.

Fiscal policy for development

A national budget is important because it sets how government will use its resources. For backward countries, the issue of budget takes a more crucial role considering the scant public resources available amid the massive needs of the people and economy. In fact, for the Philippines, government needs to take a bigger responsibility to ensure that the people’s most basic needs such as education, health and housing, among others are met adequately given the chronic poverty and job scarcity.

At the same time, government must sensibly use the budget to invest in programs and policies which create the most favorable conditions for sustainable development and industrialization that will, in turn, create long-term jobs and address poverty. To achieve this, government needs a fiscal policy – tools on raising revenues and ways to spend them – that redistributes wealth and best serves the interests of the people, in particular the poor and marginalized.

Alas, despite its trappings of reformist language and deceptive increases in allocation for social services, the Aquino administration’s budget proposals, including the 2013 budget, are still reflective of the same anti-people and anti-development policy thinking of the past regimes; and still emasculated by the Marcosian automatic debt servicing. (end)

Martial Law legacy: debt servicing, top priority from Macoy to Noynoy

Image from gmanetwork.com

Last September 21, the country marked the 40^th anniversary of the imposition of Martial Law by the late strongman Ferdinand Marcos. Those dark years were notorious for the numerous cases of human rights atrocities committed by the military; for the unprecedented cronyism; and for the massive and flagrant ransacking of state coffers by Marcos, his relatives and friends.

Seldom pointed out is how the Marcos dictatorship also instituted national policies that further tied our pre-industrial economy to perpetual backwardness and bound a great majority of our people to acute poverty. Seldom pointed out is how the anti-Marcos faction of the ruling elite led by Cory Aquino who supposedly restored democracy, and her successors – including son, incumbent President Benigno Aquino – have upheld and continued these policies to the serious detriment of the country and the people.

One such policy was automatic debt servicing. Guaranteed payments of the national debt, even if they were incurred under questionable circumstances; went to the pockets of corrupt government officials; and/or used to fund programs and projects that harmed the economy and the people is a testament to the still dismal state of governance and democracy in the country 40 years after Martial Law was imposed.

That the Marcosian policy of automatic debt servicing continues to deprive the people of much needed social services contradicts assertions by the Aquino government of a pro-people national budget. It has hyped, for instance, its proposed 2013 ₱2.006-trillion national budget as “Empowerment Budget”, building on its previous packaging of “Reform Budget” (2011) and “Results-Focused Budget” (2012). Underlying all these budget proposals is the theme of “daang matuwid” (straight path) and “kung walang corrupt, walang mahirap” (without corruption, there’s no poverty).

But behind the pro-people packaging is the reality that the priorities and programs of government, as reflected in its national budget, remain unresponsive to the urgent social needs of the poor and development requirements of the country. From the late strongman Macoy to the son of supposed democracy icons Noynoy, keeping the creditors assured has always been the top priority in crafting the national budget.

Current debt data

Marcos’s borrowing spree – from less than $1 billion when he first became President in 1966, the foreign debt ballooned to $28 billion by the time he was kicked out of Malacañang twenty-years later – set off the crippling debt burden that the country has had to endure. To keep the foreign loans coming, which had become the dictatorship’s largest source of corruption (one estimate claimed that Marcos pocketed at least ⅓ of foreign loans), Marcos issued Presidential Decree (PD) 1177 or the Budget Reform Decree of 1977 that automatically appropriates for debt servicing regardless of how much is left of the country’s resources to fund basic social services. The late President Corazon Aquino affirmed this policy through Executive Order (EO) 292 or the Administrative Code of 1987.

As of July 2012, the outstanding debt of the national government, according to the Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) stood at ₱5.16 trillion, of which ₱3.12 trillion (61%) come from domestic creditors and the rest, ₱2.04 trillion (39%) from foreign lenders.  When President Aquino assumed office in June 2010, that debt was pegged at ₱4.58 trillion (₱2.59 trillion, domestic; ₱1.99 trillion, foreign). Since taking over, the Aquino administration has added more than ₱580 billion to the debt burden, or an average of more than ₱23 billion a month (July 2010 to July 2012). During the Arroyo administration, the outstanding debt of the national government was growing by a monthly average of ₱21 billion (January 2001 to June 2010).

Meanwhile, looking at the foreign debt data (which include public and private debt, with the former accounting for 77% of the $62.9-billion total as of March 2012) as monitored by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), it appears that the country’s external loans have been accumulating most rapidly under the current Aquino administration with an average of $268.81 million per month. It is the largest monthly growth in foreign debt among all post-Marcos administrations. (See Chart)

A news report on the latest debt data noted that each Filipino now owes the national government’s creditors some ₱53,715 (based on the latest estimated population of 96 million by the National Statistical Coordination Board of NSCB). A minimum wage earner in the National Capital Region (NCR) will need to give his salary for 120 to 131 workdays if he will be forced to pay for his share of this debt; or 232 days if he is from the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).

Meager allocation for social services

But the real impact of such heavy debt burden is felt by the poor in the meager allocation that important social services get from government because limited resources are being siphoned off by automatic debt servicing. And Aquino is proving to be worse than Arroyo in this respect. Under the Aquino administration, government has already shelled out ₱1.45 trillion for debt servicing from July 2010 to July 2012. It’s equivalent to ₱58.05 billion a month, almost ₱10 billion bigger than Arroyo’s ₱48.18 billion a month during her prolonged 9 ½-year term. (See Table 1)

Further, debt servicing relative to total expenditures (including principal repayments) is pegged at almost 59% under Aquino, compared to 42% under Arroyo; and relative to total revenues collected, it’s 76% under Aquino and 66% under Arroyo. These figures mean that that the absolute increase in debt servicing in the past two years is exerting more pressure on public resources which could not cope with the country’s growing expenses, including the need to pay for government’s mounting debts. To finance its expenses, including payments for past debts, the Aquino administration is borrowing more.

Debt servicing continues to eat up a huge portion of the national budget despite claims by the Aquino administration that social services are now being prioritized by government. The expenditure program from 2011 to the proposed 2013 national budget, for instance, shows that the budget for debt servicing (including principal amortization) is equivalent to an average of 2.5 times that of the budget for education; 6.4 times, health; and 11.2 times, housing. (See Table 2)

To be concluded

Sona and high prices

Issues that matter to ordinary folks such as how Meralco and other big companies owned by Aquino’s super-rich relatives and friends are oppressing the people with skyrocketing fees were left unarticulated in the Sona (Photo from Pinoy Weekly)

The third State of the Nation Address (Sona) of President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III lasted 1 hour and 39 minutes. It was his longest Sona so far. But the 8,890-word speech never made reference to the perennial problem of consumers – the ever rising costs of electricity, petroleum, water and other basic goods and services. In fact, the issue of high prices and what his administration plans to do to address it has never been a topic in Aquino’s annual Sona.

Read the full transcript of Sona here and the English translation here

The non-mention of the problem of high prices was made more conspicuous by the almost simultaneous increases in electricity rates, water rates and oil prices just days before the Sona. The Manila Electric Co. (Meralco), the country’s largest power distributor, hiked its distribution charge by 29.1 centavos per kilowatt-hour (kWh) and its generation charge by 32 centavos; private water concessionaires Manila Water Co. and Maynilad Water Services Inc. increased their rates by 39 centavos and 89 centavos per cubic meter, respectively. Oil companies, meanwhile, have increased the pump price of unleaded gasoline by ₱4.35 per liter and diesel by ₱3.10 after three straight weeks of price hikes this month, including the latest round hours after Sona.

Costs have been unjustly increasing since long ago due to programs initiated by Aquino’s predecessors, namely the deregulation of the oil industry in 1996-1998 and the privatization of the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) in 1997 under former Pres. Fidel Ramos, and the privatization of the National Power Corp. (Napocor) in 2001 under Mrs. Gloria Arroyo.

However, Aquino is still accountable for continuing these programs and not even bothering to at least review them despite their harmful impact on consumers. In fact, the President even made these programs the centerpiece of his development plan such as the public-private partnership (PPP) scheme.

And if you were wondering why the triple whammy of power, water and oil price hikes did not merit even a single sentence in Aquino’s Sona, or why addressing the issue of high prices has never been an agenda of the President, for that matter, this previous post might help enlighten you.

Indeed, the families running the country’s largest utilities and burdening the consumers with exorbitant prices are among the closest allies and long-time cronies of the Aquino clan. Petron, the biggest oil firm in the Philippines, is majority-owned by San Miguel Corp. (SMC) of Aquino’s maternal uncle Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco Jr. while the Ayalas are connected with Pilipinas Shell; Meralco is controlled by SMC, the Lopezes and Manny V. Pangilinan’s group; and Manila Water is controlled by the Ayalas while Maynilad is co-owned by Pangilinan and the Consunjis.

Aquino’s longest Sona yet mentioned many indicators to highlight the supposedly improving economy such as credit rating upgrade, stock exchange performance, and growth in the gross domestic product (GDP), among others. But these indicators are not only abstract for the ordinary folks; they also do not mean increased economic opportunities. They are, however, indicators of how big business is enjoying a favorable environment under Aquino, reaping whatever little wealth is being squeezed from the pre-industrial economy.

Meanwhile, the issues that matter to us such as how Meralco, Petron, Shell Maynilad, Manila Water and other big companies owned by Aquino’s super-rich relatives and friends are oppressing us with skyrocketing prices and rates were left unarticulated by the landlord President.

Sona 2012: Aquino’s failure to ease poverty and provide social services

Deceptive. How can the CCT ease poverty when the program’s beneficiaries are being driven away by big business? (Photo from Bulatlat.com)

Part III: Reviewing Aquino’s “Social Contract” and performance

Read Part I: On job creation here

Read Part II: How the rich is getting (scandalously) richer here

Two of the most important commitments Aquino made in his so-called Social Contract are the provision of social services, specifically education and health; and poverty reduction. To review, Aquino promised to make education the central strategy for investing in the people, reducing poverty and building national competitiveness. He also vowed to advance and protect public health as a key measure of good governance and not as a tool for political patronage. Finally, he pledged to reorient Arroyo’s anti-poverty programs that instill a dole-out mentality to well-considered programs that build capacity and create opportunity among the poor and marginalized.

In the run-up to the President’s third Sona, Malacañang has been pretty aggressive in its propaganda on how the administration is supposedly addressing the basic needs of the people. The new budget proposal of government for 2013, for instance, is being packaged as empowering the marginalized, with significant increases in the allocation for basic social services and bigger conditional cash transfer (CCT) budget. Government has also been advertising economic growth as inclusive, with the supposed benefits being felt by everyone.

Gradual improvement?

The administration’s propaganda is being propped up by what it makes appear as favorable results of recent SWS surveys on poverty and hunger. In its second quarter survey, the SWS reported that the number of families who consider themselves poor dropped to 10.3 million or 51% of the total from 11.1 million or 55% in the first quarter. During the same period, the number of families who experience involuntary hunger declined to 3.8 million or 18.4% from 4.8 million or 23.8 percent.

Presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda was quick to credit the administration for this, claiming that the improvement was due to “programs on inclusive growth, education, public health and anti-corruption”. Another Malacañang mouthpiece, Secretary Ricky Carandang, credited the CCT program for the “gradual improvement”.

Steady deterioration

But what trends show is not gradual improvement but steady deterioration in poverty and hunger under the Aquino administration. In 2010, poverty averaged 48% among Filipino families; it then went up to 49% in 2011 and this year is averaging 53% (including the last SWS survey). Likewise, hunger steadily increased from 19% (2010) to 20% (2011) and to 21% (2012). In the last nine SWS quarterly surveys, which cover the Aquino presidency, poverty breached the 50%-mark and hunger breached the 20%-mark in five of the nine quarters. Also, hunger under Aquino is now twice the level during the Estrada administration due to the accumulated impact of flawed economic programs and policies, which failed to address poverty and hunger.

Such steady deterioration in poverty and hunger is happening amid the massive expansion in the coverage of and spending for the ballyhooed CCT program of the Aquino administration. Between 2009 and 2012, the number of CCT beneficiaries ballooned from 594,356 households to more than 3 million (or an enormous 407% increase); the national budget for CCT during the same period also swelled from ₱5 billion to ₱39.4 billion (or a whopping 688% hike). CCT is not only failing to make a dent in poverty and hunger, it is also helpless in even slowing down their further worsening.

Stand-alone

Despite repeated statements by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), the agency in-charge of the program, that the CCT is not a stand-alone initiative and is being complemented by longer-term and sustainable poverty alleviation interventions, the truth is the CCT is the only program of government to supposedly fight poverty. Aside from providing direct but temporary cash assistance, the conditionalities imposed by the CCT on beneficiaries are also purportedly meant to improve the basic health and education situation in the country. To continue receiving the maximum ₱1,400 a month, a beneficiary-household’s children and pregnant women must attend health centers and posts to get regular preventive health checkups and immunizations. Children must also enroll in schools and attend more than 85% of school classes.

But a look at measurable indicators, like those being monitored by the National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) on Philippine social development commitments to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), would show that the country continues to fail to attend to the most basic health and education needs of the people. In particular, it is failing in reducing the maternal mortality rate, reducing the prevalence of underweight children under five years old, increasing the completion rate in elementary level, increasing the enrollment rate in secondary level, and improving the results of achievement tests in the elementary and secondary levels, among others.

The reason is that while the Aquino administration intends to instantly improve the coverage of public health and education in the country through the CCT, it does little to ensure the sustained and greater access of the poor to these services. While government is hyping the supposed increases in the budget allocation for basic social services in the past two years, as well as in its 2013 budget proposal, in reality the urgent social services needs of the people remain largely unaddressed and resources allotted remain significantly insufficient.

Neglecting health

Under the 2012 budget, for instance, allocations for 23 state-owned specialty and regular hospitals nationwide were pinned to their 2011 levels despite growing requirements while those which increased their operation and maintenance funds were still unable to recover the huge cuts they had in the past. Further, the Coalition on Health Budget Increase (CBHI) also reported that the state subsidy to indigent patients for confinement or use of specialized equipment has been completely scrapped by the administration.

Another major initiative of government to supposedly improve access to health and complement the CCT is universal healthcare through the country’s national health insurance program (NHIP) being implemented by the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (Philhealth). This year, Philhealth saw its budget jump by 244% from its 2011 level and in the 2013 budget proposal, it will receive ₱12.6 billion, or almost ₱600 million bigger than its 2012 budget. But as pointed out by the CBHI, Philhealth does not ensure affordable and accessible health services since it is restricted by a budget ceiling for particular health and illness. In addition, the acute need for medicine, supplies and equipment in public hospitals forces beneficiaries to shoulder the expenses for such needs while those in far flung areas, where majority of the poor live, could hardly find Philhealth-accredited hospitals.

Further, the total budget proposed for the Department of Health (DOH) next year is only ₱56.8 billion. Although ₱11 billion higher than its 2012 budget, the said allocation is just a fraction of the ₱243.5 billion that the sector needs to cover the costs of public health care delivery system, health human resource maintenance and development, and preventive and public health programs and promotion, based on initial estimates by the Health Alliance for Democracy (Head).

Insufficient education facilities

The same thing is true with basic education, which despite the seemingly large increases in budget allotment still remains wanting in resources. Estimates by the Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) said government needs to allocate ₱96.5 billion to meet basic inputs for education such as classrooms, chairs, textbooks and water and sanitation facilities. As of School Year 2011-2012, the estimated gross shortages of classrooms reached almost 153,000; school seats, more than 13,000; textbooks, almost 96,000; sanitation facilities, more than 151,000; as well as teachers, almost 104,000, according to the Department of Education (DepEd). But in the 2013 budget proposal of Aquino, allocation for basic educational facilities is pegged at only ₱25.3 billion, which despite increasing by almost ₱9 billion from its current budget is still a meager amount compared to the estimated actual and urgent needs of the sector.

Worse, the DepEd has decided to push through with its controversial K+12 program despite strong public opposition. The program will add two more years to the country’s basic formal education that is presently a 10-year program. Among other impacts, the K+12 program means additional costs for poor families while further stretching the already tight budget for public education. All this means that children of CCT beneficiaries are not assured of completing basic education (which the DepEd prolonged under the K+12 scheme nor accessing quality education (due to perennial shortages in public school facilities and teachers that the national budget could not cover).

The lack of sufficient budget for education and health is being used by the Aquino administration and its allies to justify PPP initiatives in the said sectors such as the proposed corporatization of 26 public hospitals and PPP contracts to build 10,000 to 30,000 classrooms. But this further contradicts the stated objectives of CCT to improve access to health and education as fees tend to rise with private contractors passing the full costs to the public, on top of their own profits.

Displacing the poor

The deception of the CCT is further exposed by government’s treatment of urban poor communities, where many of the beneficiaries live. Because of its centerpiece economic program, the PPP, large areas of urban poor settlements are being demolished or in several cases, set on fire. Peasant, fisherfolk and indigenous communities, who are the poorest of the poor, are also being physically and economically displaced by PPP and mining, energy, plantation and other destructive projects that the Aquino administration has been promoting. How can the CCT ease poverty when the program’s beneficiaries are being driven away by big business?

In the National Capital Region (NCR) alone, the Demolition Watch reported that some 16,000 families in 20 urban poor communities have already been displaced in the first two years of the Aquino administration. The Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) – NCR said that the region hosts some 14 large PPP projects, including business districts and parks, port privatization, etc. which could displace as much as 1.4 million poor families.

Aggravating the condition of the urban poor is, like in the case of health and housing, state budget on housing is utterly lacking. Despite the seemingly huge increase in the housing budget for 2013 – from ₱6.1 billion to ₱16.13 (excluding the housing bduget for military and police personnel) – the amount still pales in comparison with the estimated requirement of ₱69 billion for the country to meet a portion of its 3.6 million housing backlog and at least be at par with the housing spending of its neighbors in Southeast Asia, based on preliminary calculations by think tank Ibon Foundation.

Right to decent living standard

Aquino has been massively expanding the scope and budget of the CCT despite the fact that it is not clearly contributing to sustained poverty reduction, not to mention that it is funded by $805 million in growing foreign debt from the World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB) that has long been debilitating the economy and depriving the poor of much needed social services. One of the biggest reasons why government could not provide adequate education, health, housing and other basic services is because public resources are being siphoned off by debt servicing, which under Aquino has already reached an all-time high of more than ₱60 billion a month.

Access to health and education, and the right to a decent standard of living including the provision of adequate shelter are basic human rights. This means that the government must work towards the creation of an environment that makes freedom from hunger and poverty, and universal access to social services possible, which includes reliable and sufficient livelihood opportunities for all families and the allocation of adequate resources for quality public schools, hospitals, health facilities, and housing services.

Requiring some poor Filipino families to send their children to school and health centers so that they can access CCT money promotes a dole-out mentality and is a distortion of the concept of human rights. It also distorts human right to health and education and to a decent standard of living by creating temporary access for a targeted portion of poor families while using the conditional cash grants as a smokescreen for the defective policies that push an increasing number of Filipinos to hunger, ignorance, and poverty such as the PPP and other programs that benefit only the rich. (End)

Sona 2012: How the rich is getting (scandalously) richer under Aquino

Among the major commitments he made in his so-called Social Contract, creating favorable conditions for private business is the only promise that Aquino has been fulfilling (Photo from The Philippine Star)

Part II: Reviewing Aquino’s “Social Contract” and performance

Read Part I: On job creation here

In 2009, the Forbes magazine reported that the 40 richest Filipinos had a combined wealth of $22.4 billion. Last year, the amount more than doubled to $47.43 billion, amid deteriorating poverty and joblessness. What explains such rapid accumulation of wealth? The short and simple answer is that government, including the incumbent Aquino administration, has been creating the most favorable policy environment for big business.

Indeed, Aquino’s apathy to the working class is matched only by his concern for big business. In fact, among the major commitments he made in his so-called Social Contract, creating favorable conditions for private business is the only promise that Aquino has been fulfilling.

In particular, the administration is creating a conducive environment and providing more profit-making opportunities for big business through further privatization of infrastructure, utilities, social services and other vital sectors, or what is called public-private partnership (PPP). Aquino has also aggressively promoted extractive industries including foreign-dominated, export-oriented mining and oil and gas exploration that create social, development and ecological issues.

Privatization and plunder

He has been calling it “daang matuwid” but Aquino’s good governance campaign is more about instituting reforms to reduce business costs and risks than going after big-time plunderers like Mrs. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. His campaign to oust Renato Corona as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (SC) was less about his supposed reform agenda but more about consolidating his control over the entire bureaucracy.

Executive hegemony over government branches that make policies (Congress) and review the legality of such policies (Judiciary) creates an even more favorable political environment to push for retrogressive economic programs that favor certain big local businesses and their foreign partners. They include those who are closely associated with the Cojuangco-Aquino clan and are taking advantage of government’s centerpiece program, the PPP, as well as new contracts in mining and oil and gas exploration, among others.

These big business interests are the same companies that have been expanding their economic empire by taking over, through PPP deals, infrastructure development in energy, telecommunications, transport, and water and storage in the past almost three decades. They include the Ayala family ($10.2 billion in investment commitments from 1984 to 2009); Lopez ($7.1 billion); Pangilinan ($5.3 billion); Razon ($3.2 billion); Aboitiz ($2.8 billion); Ang/Cojuangco of SMC ($2.6 billion); and Consunji ($1.1 billion).

Expectedly, they are the same families that are bagging PPP contracts under the current regime. The Ayalas and its Spanish partner, for instance, cornered the ₱1.9-billion Daang Hari – SLEx link road project. Meanwhile, the Ayala family is also competing with the Ang/Cojuangco group, Pangilinan and Consunji and their respective foreign partners for the ₱60-billion LRT Line 1 extension project. PPP projects oppress the poor not only through higher user fees. To give way to PPP projects, tens of thousands of urban poor families are also being displaced from their communities. (More on this in the next article)

Aside from infrastructure and utilities, another major source of massive profits for the local elite and foreign corporations is the wanton extraction and exploitation of the country’s natural wealth; in particular the vast domestic reserves of mineral and energy resources. Three of Aquino’s closest businessmen-allies are already dominating the energy sector with power firms associated with Cojuangco, Aboitiz and Lopez controlling more than half of the national generating capacity.

For sure, these families were able to increase their power portfolio even before Aquino became President. But under Aquino, they are enjoying even more opportunities for expansion as government implements the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira) of 2001 even more aggressively. Aquino has made a strong pitch to fully implement the Epira in Mindanao, where Cojuangco and Aboitiz have pending coal-fired power plant projects and where private power operators are eyeing the privatization of the Agus-Pulangi hydropower complex.

Meanwhile, it is estimated that some 24% of approved mining applications have been clinched in the first two years of the Aquino administration. As such, it’s not a coincidence that Cojuangco’s SMC has been on a buying spree of mining firms in the past two years.

In 2011, it bought 10.1% stake in Australian firm Indophil Resources NL which owns 37.5% of Sagittarius Mines Inc. (the rest owned by Swiss firm Xstrata Copper), the operator of the estimated $5.9-billion Tampakan copper-gold project in South Cotabato – one of the world’s largest undeveloped sites. In 2010, SMC bought three coal mines in South Cotabato and Sultan Kudarat previously owned by Daguma Agro Minerals, Inc., Bonanza Energy Resources, Inc. and Sultan Energy Mining and Development Corp.

But mining, while profitable, is also contentious and invites strong opposition from various sectors. Consistent with the deception of daang matuwid, Aquino recently issued Executive Order (EO) No. 79, which supposedly attends to concerns on environmental degradation and negligible economic benefits from mining.

While the EO imposes a mining ban on 78 areas designated as ecotourism sites (including Palawan, apparently to appease Gina Lopez and co.) and a moratorium on new mining deals until Congress passes a new law that will increase government’s mining revenues, it will not stop controversial and greatly destructive mining projects such as SMC’s Tampakan. More significantly, Aquino does not intend to reorient the industry and reverse its liberalization the Mining Act of 1995.

Land (un)reform

In his Social Contract, Aquino also promised to recognize farms and rural enterprises as vital to achieving food security and more equitable economic growth. In his PDP, he identified food security and increased rural incomes as among the major goals of government. Also, for agriculture to fulfill its role in reducing rural poverty and achieve food security in the long term, increased incomes, productivity and production shall be enhanced, according to the PDP.

While government boasts of improving rice and food production, even claiming that the country may become self-sufficient in rice by next year, agriculture officials also admit that domestic agriculture remains very dependent favorable weather. But what make domestic food production especially vulnerable to adverse weather events are the accumulated effects of decades of neoliberal restructuring such as trade liberalization, land use conversion, promotion of export crops, etc. which aggravate the basic problems of backward agricultural system (one report said Philippine agriculture is among the least mechanized in Southeast Asia) and landlessness among the direct food producers.

Alas, Aquino is not reversing these neoliberal policies much less implement genuine land reform. The dismantling of large haciendas for land distribution is not in Aquino’s agenda, which of course is not unexpected for someone who comes from one of the wealthiest and most influential landlord clans in the country. Last year, the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) was able to distribute just 113,196 hectares out of the already small target of 200,000 hectares, or an accomplishment rate of below 57 percent.

DAR data also show that since taking over as President in July 2010, Aquino’s land acquisition and distribution (LAD) has averaged below 18,000 hectares a month – the second lowest among all post-Edsa administrations. As of yearend 2011, government still needs to acquire and distribute almost 962,000 hectares of land, which at its current LAD rate will be accomplished two to three years after the 2014 deadline set by the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with Reforms (Carper).

Such lackluster performance in LAD is indicative of how the landlord President is indifferent to the plight of landless farmers. The Aquino family’s Hacienda Luisita remains a contentious target for land distribution despite the Supreme Court (SC) ruling, which revoked the stock distribution option (SDO) and ordered the transfer of the sprawling sugar estate to the direct control of farmers and farmworkers.

Taking advantage of the basic flaws of Carper, the President himself is pushing for so-called “just compensation” that his family calculates at a staggering ₱10 billion – a further insult to the poor farmers who are the real owners of the hacienda.

Instead of land reform and consistent with its bias for big corporations, the Aquino administration has been promoting projects that result in further displacement of farmers such as the case of almost 700,000 hectares of agricultural lands that foreign firms from the US, Europe, Middle East and others control (or will control) through agribusiness deals. And as mentioned, the PPP and mining projects that also grab lands away from tillers.

Genuine land reform is indispensable if Aquino truly wants to increase rural income and reduce rural poverty like he stated in his Social Contract and PDP. As shown in previous studies, dismantling the land monopoly will generate an enormous amount of income and free up huge resources, in the process reducing poverty in the countryside where two out of three poor Filipinos live.

Part III: Aquino’s failure to ease poverty and provide social services

Photos: protests mark Aquino’s second year in office

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Activist group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) led protesters in a march around Manila’s communities before reaching Mendiola bridge to mark the second year of the Aquino administration. The group also announced that it is now preparing to mount a nationwide day of action in time for Aquino’s third State of the Nation Address (Sona) on July 23. Read Bayan’s news release here.

Read more on Aquino’s performance as President here