ZTE, Jpepa, RP-China agreement
These are truly trying times in the Philippines. These are really shameful days for the Filipinos. The Constitution continues to occupy a distinct place in the honor roll of corruption in the world. The national leadership remains in a dismal level of the negative approval and trust rating registered by the citizens. Meantime, millions of people are denied decent living; the sick die and the elderly cry for lack of basic social services, children of poor families have no opportunity to go to school.
Meantime, the people watch the spectacle of the current administration attempting to make one scandalous deals after another, with foreign governments. With its foreseen dismissal or demise soon, this administration appears to be in a hurry to make money, to satisfy a much bloated ego — at the expense of the country and its people as a matter of course. This is the classic example of the "I" above and over everybody and everything else.
Many municipalities have no electricity even. There are police stations with but one old typewriter each. Most of the country's public schools do not even have a computer for their students. And there are students who do not even have pencils. And out of nowhere, there is the grand government project of a national broadband network courtesy of ZTE. This can only be the grand idea of a visionary with head in the cloud and feet in the air.
Many places are already loaded with their own garbage. Even Metro Manila is having a very hard time disposing its tons of waste. Many provinces are already suffering from the destruction of their environment. Recently, there were rivers in Central Luzon that have been found out and thus declared among the dirtiest in the world. And there is again this government going for broke in the matter of accepting foreign toxic waste through the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement (Jpepa). Again, only a self-proclaimed visionary with much inflated self-image can conceive such betrayal of the people and violation of their land.
Many farmers have no farms to till. And even those who are entitled to have their own farmlands are violently driven away from the little place they till — if not meted the penalty of summary execution, such as the beneficiaries of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (Carp). The Carp has become not only hard but also dangerous to actualize. Certain landlords have once more become not only powerful but also harbor hardcore greed. And here comes this government having the RP-China agreement at heart. It is foreseen to cover not only Carp but even the Carp-able lands. Again, only a visionary without conscience and genuine vision could betray the farmers who have been feeding the people for centuries with their sweat and toil.
ZTE, Jpepa, RP-China agreement — go away!